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Fig. 2 | BMC Biotechnology

Fig. 2

From: Development of a vitrification method for preserving human myoblast cell sheets for myocardial regeneration therapy

Fig. 2

Effects of vitrification on cell-cell adhesion and ECM integrity. a Evaluation of cell-cell adhesion in the fresh and vitrification groups by TEM. The triangles show the structure of cell-cell junctions. The circles show cell-cell junction structures such as desmosomes. C, Cytoplasm. N, nucleus. b Evaluation of the ECM by immunohistochemistry. Immunohistochemistry revealed that in both the fresh and vitrification groups, fibronectin, N-cadherin, and integrin α5 were expressed on the basement membrane in myoblasts. In addition, collagen I was expressed in the ECM. Scale bar, 100 μm. c, d Evaluation of the ECM by western blotting. Western blotting demonstrated the expression of fibronectin, collagen I, N-cadherin, and integrin α5 in the fresh and vitrification groups. The fresh group was evaluated before cryopreservation. The cryopreserved cell-sheet constructs of the vitrification group were thawed at 2 days (D), 1 week (W), 1 month (M), and 3 months for assessment. The results are expressed as the means ± SD (n = 8 independent experiments)

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